books

There is so much great healing available to you this summer just by curating your beach bag / pool bag / commute bag / waiting for your kid while they’re in a class bag. I’m excited to share with you my top picks to thrive and heal this summer!

I am totally delinquent posting this book review since I read a preview copy from the publisher a couple of months ago during my Summer of Memoir. I'll be honest, I've had a really hard time writing this review because Cheryl B., the author of My Awesome Place, was my friend and she is dead. This is not a spoiler alert, it's in the first line of the foreward by Sarah Schulman. "Cheryl Burke died of medical malpractice in June 2011 at the age of 38."

When I was asked to be part of the Gaga Feminism blog tour, I engaged my collaborator and dear friend Taylor Black to help me write some questions for QueerFatFemme.com. We've had bourbon/coke zero/cherry juice discussions about Jack Halberstam's work before and Gaga Feminism, out this week from Beacon Press, is the latest in the academic arsenal of the USC professor, blogger, and ubiquitous Queer Studies scholar.

Check out what Jack has to say about desire, feminism, Lady Gaga and failure below, and Beacon Press is giving away a copy of the book at the bottom of this post!

And beyond just telling us the who, where, what and how of her life, she's extremely revealing about her process. Not just some of the deepest parts of her personality (as Kate says in the book, "Life's better without secrets,"), like her diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder, but also the internal process of what it was like to be here. She cracks open her heart and shows us the internal realities of growing-up and adulthood prior to transitioning, many ongoing touchstones of what it was like knowing she was "girl," how she related to it and how she either leaned into it or away from it with facial hair, women, weight and clothing. Her lifelong battle with anorexia, how she learned to starve herself and then how she learned to think she could be pretty while being voluptuous. What it is like as a cutter, the pain and relief and how she used it to get through. Vivid plans for suicide attempts.

However, in these "troubled economic times" or as I like to call it "The Hateful Bush Economy" it is extremely crucial to support art made for our community, by our community. Since so many of the authors in the book submitted for the love of Femme community and don't get paid for it, I thought I would throw back a little love at them!

I'm Bevin your Femmecee at QueerFatFemme.com, where I chronicle the relentless pursuit of my joy. Life is really great when you learn to love your body and step out of the closet! I believe all bodies are good bodies and work to make the world safe for people to love themselves. I blog about body liberation, travel, plus size fashion, sexuality, relationships, spirituality, authenticity, and having a really fun life following your own inner guidance. I love Dolly Parton, Miss Piggy, Dorothy Allison and Alice Walker. Grab a cup of tea, cozy up to your computer and enjoy!

Donate here to help spread the message that All Bodies Are Worthy of Love Exactly As They Are.